


Pneumothorax

by LouiseC



Category: Hawaii Five-0 (2010)
Genre: Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-28
Updated: 2013-02-28
Packaged: 2017-12-03 21:43:17
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,548
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/702940
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LouiseC/pseuds/LouiseC
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Grace does science but it's Steve and Danny who learn the lesson.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Pneumothorax

“You really don’t get it, do you?” Danny slams the car door with as much force as he can. Then he curses, it is after all his car even if he rarely drives it anymore.

Steve can tell that Danny is fired up, that this is more than the usual post-explosion rant and his brain is quickly assessing the nearest exit from this conversation and the safest escape route. Inside, where he hopes Chin or Kono have a lead to distract his partner. The one who had yelled the entire drive back to HQ and has turned a tourist-with-sunburn shade of crimson. 

  Making a point of being gentler than Danny (who is the Neanderthal now, hey?), Steve closes the driver’s side door and starts walking. He gets all of three steps before a hand grabs his shoulder and wrenches him around. 

“Do not walk away from me, Steven,” Danny’s whole body is radiating anger and Steve can see that his partner’s finger, which is currently shoved in his face, is shaking.

“You do not, ever, ever again get on a boat that you know is going to explode. Not when you can stand on the pier and actually see the bomb duct taped to the fucking hull. In plain sight. Never. Do you hear me? There wasn’t even anybody on the boat until you decided to haul your suicidal ass up there.”

  “There were other boats, Danny,” Steve shrugs, and really, how can Danny not accept that it was the obvious solution. “Other people on other boats in the berths nearby. I had to move the boat out of the marina. It was the only safe thing to do.”  

“Safe? The safe thing to do would have been to wait for the bomb squad or for you, Mr I have a friend in every department of every law enforcement and military branch from here to the Rockies to the Coral Sea and back, for you to call a buddy at EOD and get the bomb... oh I don’t know... disposed of.”

“I did dispose of it.”

“You almost disposed of yourself at the same time. Did you think about that before you leapt onto a soon-to-be-fireball and drove it out to sea?”  

Steve opens his mouth to protest but Danny isn’t done.

  “And if you dare, dare correct me because I said you drove the boat, I swear McGarrett your health insurance will hang up on you when you call to make a claim for the dental work you’re going to need. You are a reckless, infuriating, selfish, attention-seeking, completely insane human being with an inflated, indestructible pinniped complex. And I’m this close to over it.”

“An indestructible what?” Steve takes a step into Danny’s space and uses his height to combat the shorter man’s attitude. “I know it’s not what you’re used to but you have to remember that I’ve spent my entire adult life dealing with this stuff, bombs and exploding boats.”

“I don’t care. Normal, rational human beings do not spring headlong into danger at every chance they get. Do you have any idea how long you were under the water for this time? It felt like an hour. I know it was only four minutes but it felt like an hour. I for one prefer my partners un-exploded and breathing. And I’d also rather not have to explain to my eight year old daughter why Steve, who against all better judgment she likes and seems to think is indestructible, is dead.”

“I wouldn’t have done it if I didn’t think I could. I don’t just think ‘Hmm maybe I will give it a go,’ I was trained for this stuff.”  
“Were you also trained to nearly die every time you lace your boots, Commander? Because even for a beat cop in the worst part of Jersey, daily death is not imminent.”

“Yes,” Steve practically hisses, because that hits a nerve. “Yes, I was. Ok? It’s not something I can forget about. And it’s not something that you’re ever gonna understand.” He turns and walks into the building.

Danny runs his hand over his hair and pulls down on the back of his neck, as if somehow he can trigger a release of the tension that has wound itself through his entire body. He waits a minute before taking a deep breath and is about to follow his partner into the building when he thinks better of it. 

It’s already 4:30 and he gets Grace again tonight, a rare midweek stay while Rachel attends some fundraising thing that some business associate of Stan’s is hosting in LA. Danny kind of tuned out the details. All that he cares is that he gets to see his daughter for an extra three days.

So he texts Chin that he’s done for the day, and he leaves.

\- - -

“How’s the picture coming, Monkey?” Danny leans over the back of Grace’s chair to inspect her colouring.

  “It’s good. This is the last one and then you’ll let me use your computer to type my report, won’t you Danno?” Her voice holds not a hint of begging but she uses the no-mercy, can’t say no to me eyes. 

“Sure I will. I’ll log you into my laptop, ok?”

“Ok,” Grace smiles up at him before turning her attention back to the work in front of her.

Danny leans against the doorframe for a minute, just watching his daughter colour. The way her left hand braces the paper and her right making neat, perfect little marks inside the lines they traced out of the reference book earlier. She concentrates on her project with a focus that is frankly a little scary in an eight year old.

With a sigh, he pushes himself off the wall and flops on the couch in the other room. He lays with his head propped up and his forearm flung over his head. He listens to the scratch of the pencils on the table and blocks out the insanity that was his day.

The scratching is soon replaced by the clicking of laptop keys as Grace begins typing her animal report. His living room is littered with a dozen or so reference books that arrived in a bag almost as heavy as the girl carrying them. He’d barely had to supervise her yesterday as she answered the typical habitat and dietary questions about her assigned animal. 

“I think I’m gonna have a nap, the bad guys were fast today. You need any help before I do?” He wills her to say yes because it means there’s still a thing or two he can teach her.

“Nope”

Damn. “Ok. You come get me if you do.”

“Yup.” After a few seconds silence she calls out. “Did you know they can hold their breath for an hour?”

“Can they, Monkey? They’re kind of sneaky like that, I guess. I’m not surprised.” Yeah, not surprised at all.

 

Goddamn seals.

\- - -

The next morning, nobody mentions ‘the incident in the parking lot’, despite the fact that rumours have spread through the entire building. Steve shuts himself in his office with the box of yellow envelopes and Chin and Kono run the security tapes from the marina through facial recognition. It’s painfully slow because the footage is grainy and they have to stop and enhance anyone who looks like a body type fit to their suspect.

Danny hovers and makes a few phone calls, but really they’re depending on the tapes. Morning turns into afternoon and he’s growing restless. Then, the second there is a match, he’s on his feet and halfway to the door. 

“Well?” he looks expectantly at his teammates. “Who’s coming with me?”

Chin and Kono stare each other down like they’re playing some ocular version of scissors paper rock. Chin loses. “Right behind you, brah,” he calls after Danny’s fading footsteps. “Stay out of it, Cuz,” he warns quietly before following Danny.

\- - -  
Kono braces herself and pushes open the heavy glass door. “Ah, Steve?”

“What?” he snaps, not looking up from his computer screen.

“Woah, easy, Boss. I just wanted to tell you that I’m heading out for half an hour or so. Try not to blow anything up while I’m gone.” She can’t help but keep the slight tint of venom out of the last comment, which she had meant to be a joke. Because sure she liked that her boss was a bad-ass who got the job done, but his methods had been making things more and more strained at the office. Steve looks up and watches through the windows as Kono grabs her phone of her desk and angrily shoves her weapons into their holsters. 

“Way to go, McGarrett,” he chastises himself. “You’ve managed to piss the entire team off.” He pushes back the chair and goes after his rookie, who despite her junior status doesn’t deserve to be caught in the middle of this.

“Kono, I’m sorry,” he offers sincerely. “Where are we going?”

“Ok, don’t get excited, Boss. There’s a gas leak at Grace’s school and they want someone to come pick her up. Danny isn’t answering his cell, so I’m gonna go get her.”

“We’ll both go, I need some air and... Wait, Danny isn’t answering his cell?” Instantly Steve’s heart speeds up and his mind begins running through the hundreds of possible reasons. Danny’s been kidnapped. Danny’s been shot. Danny’s driven off a cliff and drowned. Danny’s…

“I’m sure it’s nothing, they called in an hour ago that the suspect wasn’t home so they’re paying a little visit to his mother. According to Danny, it’s ‘A bit of a schlep and wedged between two mountains which have no business being as green as they are,’ so they probably don’t have signal.”

Danny doesn’t have signal. Ok that he can work with.

“Let’s go then, Kalakaua. If you’re good, I might even let you drive back.”

\- - -  
“Uncle Steve?” Grace mumbles around a mouthful of burger.   

Steve just raises his eyebrow at her and gives her his best 'you shouldn’t be doing that' look. The one he gets from Danny at least twice an hour. Because he might be a Neanderthal caveman but even he knows that little girls aren’t meant to speak with their mouths full. Especially when they’re hiding in his office, eating hamburgers. If Danny ever finds out, he'll never hear the end of it.

She in turn gives him a look, which is scarily like the one Danny casts over the healthy contents of Steve’s fridge, but she swallows her food.

Uncle Steve,” she starts again. “I know there are bad guys that you have to catch, but do you want to help me make my poster?”

“Poster? Uh… sure. And Gracie, today your dad is taking care of the bad guys so I am all yours ok?”

“Excellent. You’d better sprinkle the glitter because I always make a mess.”

“Glitter?”

“Yup.” Grace returns to shoving hamburger in her mouth.

“Glitter.” Ok, Steve thinks to himself that perhaps Danny is a lot braver than he’s given him credit for.

A little while later, Grace’s poster is finished and Steve’s office looks like it has been flash-banged by a herd of My Little Ponies. There’s silver sparkle everywhere, including all over the two of them. But Steve has to admit that the poster looks great.

“Seals hey?”

“Yup. My teacher gave us an animal to make a report on and we have to show it to the whole class and read out what we’ve researched. The poster’s fun but I don't want to talk in front the whole class.”

“The whole class? You’re braver than me then.” Steve’s desire for public speaking stops at issuing orders and intimidating informants.

“No way. You’re the bravest. You have a gun and chase bad guys and you were in the Army and…”

“I was in the Navy, Grace. What has your father been telling you, I swear I’m…” he trails off when Grace starts snickering.

“Not funny. But it isn’t carrying a gun that means I am brave, Gracie. I get scared.”

“You do?” 

  “Of course I do.” 

“When?” she challenges. Because she can’t imagine what could possibly make Steve afraid.

“Um…” He searches for something he can tell her that won’t get him shot by Danny. “Well…Like today, when Kono said there was an accident at your school, that made me scared. And when someone is shooting at my team, that makes me scared. People just don’t think I am because I learnt to do what has to be done.”

Grace slowly runs her finger over the shiny silver lettering on her poster. “I’m scared to talk in front of all my class. Tommy says you’ve got to imagine everyone in their underpants but I don’t see how that is going to help.”

“No, it won’t. You've just got to practise and be brave. You can be brave like Danno, can’t you?”

“Will you listen to me?” she asks hopefully.

“Of course I will. I’m an expert on seals, Grace. I used to be one you know.”

“You weren’t this kind,” she rolls her eyes.

  “Was too,” He sits cross-legged on the floor like her schoolmates will be. “But I’m afraid I can’t tell you anything more because it is classified and I’d have to …” And there was that scary too-much-like-her-father look again.

“Ok, I’m starting now so shh. Seals: Kings of the Sea. Seals are mammals which means they have warm blood. They are called pinnipeds. They live all over the world. Some of the places they live are really cold. They have thick fat called blubber which keeps them warm. They spend lots of time in the water hunting for fish and playing. Seals eat fish and squid and other things like that. They rest on the land and the baby seals, they're called pups, are safer on land than in the water. 

“The special thing about seals is that they can dive really deep down and some can hold their breath for almost an hour. People die if they do this but seals can empty all of the air out of their lungs which stops them from breaking. There is special stuff in their lung called surfactant which stops their lungs sticking up when they are empty. When the seal goes back up to breathe their lungs can work like normal.”

Steve listens with the same focus he applies to security briefings and by the end, he’s a little bit in awe of how smart this kid is.  
“So a pinniped is a seal?” he asks when she is finished.

“Yes.”

“That explains that then,” Steve mutters to himself, forgetting that kids always hear what you don’t want them to.   

“Explains what, Uncle Steve?” Grace carefully lays her poster on the desk and sits in front of him on the floor.

“What? Oh. Nothing. Just something your dad said to me yesterday and I didn’t know what it meant.”

  “What did he say?”

He wants to blow her off, to give her one of those answers that adults think fixes things and that kids hate to hear. But she looks at him with these big, round eyes and he just can’t.

“He said I was an insane pinniped,” Steve admits and why does this feel so much like dobbing to the teacher?

“Because of the boat that blew up?”

“How did you…? Yes. I was kind of near… well I was kind of on it until a second before it blew up.” Steve hopes to hell he isn’t scarring the kid for life.

“Danno thinks I don’t know how scary his job is, but I’m not dumb. I’m eight. And I used to hear them fighting about how dangerous being a cop is.” Grace looks down, nervously flattening the pleats on her skirt between her thumb and forefinger.

Steve winces, remembering the times that he crouched on the stairs listening to the harsh words coming from the kitchen. But despite the words that came from her mouth, the young Steve could see the pride in his mother’s eyes when she looked at her husband and it always assured him that his family was secure.

He’s heard enough from Danny to know this was not the case with Rachel and he wonders if he knows Grace had overheard them. “I know, Grace, and I’m sorry you had to hear that. But that’s all over now, right?”

“Yeah. Now, Danno walks around outside, talking to himself and yelling at nobody. He says that you’re going to get yourself killed and he’s going to have paperwork up the wazoo.. um don’t tell him I said that word…”

“What else does he say, Grace?” Steve prompts gently.

“That you’re going to give him an ulcer and a heart attack and turn all his hair grey. And he said last week that you would send him to an early grave. Steve, why are you trying to kill Danno?”

“Why am I… I’m what? He said that?” And now it looks like Grace is going to start crying and Steve grabs her hands and pulls her into his lap. “Shh, it’s ok. I’m not trying to kill your Danno, Gracie. Of course I’m not.”

  “Then why does he get so mad at you?” she sniffs.

“Grace, did you ever do something dangerous that you weren't meant to. Like...uh... run onto the road without a grownup?”

  She looks at the floor kind of embarrassed. “Yes. I was talking to my friend and there was a cab coming around the corner. I didn’t look first.”

“And what did Danno do?”

“He grabbed me. And he yelled at me for not being careful. And then he hugged me and said that if anything ever happened to me it would be the end of him.”

“Because he worries about you, Grace. And I think maybe I make Danno worry about me too, sometimes. Because he thinks I don’t always look before I cross the road.”

“You should, Uncle Steve. Roads are dangerous.”

“Yes they are, Gracie. Now, let’s go find Kono and see if she can get a hold of Chin and your dad yet.” He stands up and hoists Grace onto his hip. A cloud of sparkly residue surrounds them and Steve’s not triumphantly thinking about how this is going to get all through Danny’s car. Really he’s not…

\- - -

The two of them stand on the pier, watching the wrecked hull of yesterday’s boat as it is hauled onto the barge. Well, half a hull. It’s gnarled and twisty and the entire back half is just gone.

“I get it, Danny.” Steve doesn’t take his eyes off the carnage in front them. Doesn’t dare look at his partner.

“Really?” Danny, bolder as usual, turns his body, crosses his arms and watches Steve’s profile. “Explain.”

“The boat’s no use if half of it’s blown up.”

“This is true, but it’s not about the…”

“You can’t be my partner if I get myself killed.”

Danny drops his hands and turns back to the barge, which has begun to make its way back to the pier. “Go on.”

“I go off after something and the part of me that isn’t bombs and ducking bullets just shuts down. I go into what you call ‘crazy ass super SEAL mode’, Danny, because the things I’ve seen… the things I’ve done… you can’t stay sane unless you turn the ‘normal’ part of you off.

“Eleven years, Danny. Eleven years of this and it isn’t always so easy to turn it back on again. It’s like I forget to breathe sometimes, because before, it made me weak. And now, my lungs are coming unstuck and…” he pauses.

“And?” Danny prompts.

“And you are my surfactant,” Steve waits for the impending flurry of words. 

Danny just snorts. “I’m your what?”

“Surfactant. Y’know. The stuff in seal’s lungs that stops them from collapsing in on themselves when they dive deep.”

“What are you, a zoologist now? Are you seriously using the science report of a fourth grader to explain yourself?”

“Yes. Like you can talk, you used it to insult me.”

“Well ok then,” Danny chuckles. “You’re an idiot, you do know that right?”

“I’ve been told.”

“And you’re going to be told. Every time that you do something idiotic. Until you realise that every day isn’t a crap shoot for survival.”  

“I know.”

“And that you’re not just a name, rank and serial number anymore."

“I know.”

“And that actual people care about you and maybe some of them, not all of them mind you, but some of them might even go so far as to say that they love your sorry ass.”

“I know.” 

“Good. Now let’s sign what’s left of this boat over to the crime lab and get out of here. I’ve got a daughter to hug, because it seems she’s a little freaked out by what we do. Maybe a few reassuring words about all that special training and government-issued kryptonite wouldn’t go astray. And then after that, she’s going to need someone to practise her speech on, because I for one have reached my ‘seal’ tolerance quota for the week.”

“Whatever you say, Danno.” Steve grinned. “Whatever you say.”

**Author's Note:**

> This was my first ever 5-0 story, written in 2011, posted to LJ. So if it seems familiar, that's why.
> 
> As always, comments make my little heart glow :)


End file.
